The interconnectivity of individuals and organisations has increased exponentially in recent times with the advent of various telecommunication means, including the Internet. The very success in information availability and distribution afforded by the Internet has placed a premium on effective means of identifying information relevant or interesting to the user. Internet search engines are the most prevalent means of extracting relevance from the ever expanding wealth of internet material. However, the majority of search engines suffer from numerous shortcomings.
The sheer volume of information available on even the most esoteric subjects requires search engines to filter and prioritise the search results. The mechanisms by which this ranking is achieved include:    a) Keyword frequency and meta tags;    b) Professional editors manually evaluating sites;    c) How much advertisers are prepared to pay, and    d) Measuring which web-sites webmasters think are important. This is done by link analysis, which gives more weighting to sites dependant on what other sites are linked to them.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,421,675 (enclosed herein by reference) discloses a means of refining searches according to the behaviour of previous users performing the same search. While this removes the web-site from its sole dependency of the above criteria a)-d) for its ranking, it is still driven by the influence of the whole web populous, whose interests and tastes may differ greatly from a given individual user.
It would be desirable to provide a means of influencing the ranking or weighting of search results according to the preferences of entities (individuals, groups or organisations) deemed of more relevance or importance to the user.
PCT/NZ02/00199 (incorporated herein by reference) also by the present applicant discloses a personal contact network system whereby a user may form a network of contacts known either directly or indirectly to the user. The network may be used for a variety of applications and takes advantage of the innate human trait to give a higher weighting to the opinions of those entities with whom a common positive bond is shared, such as friendship.
As outlined in patent application PCT/NZ02/00199, incentives to restrict the distribution and flow of information within a network (or the search results of a search engine) include obtaining some form of filtering of irrelevant, useless, unwanted, offensive, intrusive or in any way undesirable information or interaction with other nodes/entities. Humans consciously and subconsciously already utilise such filtering in their daily life by placing greater weighting on information from friends and acquaintances than from unfamiliar sources.
Throughout virtually every aspect of human life, economic, social, personal and business decisions are either directly or indirectly affected by the preferences, tastes and actions of our friends, colleagues and acquaintances. This is in contrast to widely accepted economic theory in the fields of, for example, consumer purchases where it is assumed individuals make rational choices based upon the available product or service information. In actual fact, a recommendation or an adverse comment from a close trusted acquaintance regarding a specific product will often override other factors in a commercial purchase decision, rightly or not. There are many other areas in which the opinions of respected acquaintances or even organisations can affect the decision making of individuals or organisations.
Examples of just a few applications or activities in which trusted or respected contacts or recommendations play a significant role include seeking employment and filling job vacancies, investment opportunities, academic co-operation, finding accommodation or people to share accommodation with, buying and selling goods and services, arranging social/sporting functions, finding friendship, romantic and/or social relationships and so forth.
Contemporary living has confronted many individuals with a daily surplus of information. This bewildering array of choices and decisions vies for the individual's attention in almost every aspect of their work, recreation, and social lives. The vast majority of information sources received by most individuals is biased to some extent by commercial interests. Consequently, there is at least the perception the information may be incomplete, misleading or false. The lack of independent objectivity from these information sources leads to scepticism and/or a sense of futility, helplessness, or ambivalence in obtaining worthwhile advice. In contrast, a recommendation by a trusted friend of a particular product, service or the like, is likely to be given far greater weighting. Such recommendations will often be accorded far greater significance than any number of expensive, professionally produced, and theoretically compelling advertisements/product recommendations.
An individual may seek a friend's opinion on a variety of issues, aside from commercial purchase issues. The choice of plumbers, dentists, lawyers and other suppliers for example, may be strongly influenced by personal recommendation. Whilst such specific choices may only arise infrequently, friends and acquaintances are often in frequent contact and may cover a wide range of matters, including opinions/recommendations on issues such as books, films, entertainment, restaurants, and many others.
It would thus be desirable to harness the recommendations, opinions and discriminatory abilities of a user's friends, acquaintances (or any other entity known directly or indirectly to the user) to enhance the results of a search engine. It would also be desirable to provide a user with indicative information derived from the search activities conducted by the members of the user's unique personal network.
All references, including any patents or patent applications cited in this specification are hereby incorporated by reference. No admission is made that any reference constitutes relevant prior art. The discussion of the references states what their authors assert, and the applicants reserve the right to challenge the accuracy and pertinency of the cited documents. It will be clearly understood that, although a number of prior art publications are referred to herein, this reference does not constitute an admission that any of these documents form part of the common general knowledge in the art, in New Zealand or in any other country.
It is acknowledged that the term ‘comprise’ may, under varying jurisdictions, be attributed with either an exclusive or an inclusive meaning. For the purpose of this specification, and unless otherwise noted, the term ‘comprise’ shall have an inclusive meaning—i.e. that it will be taken to mean an inclusion of not only the listed components it directly references, but also other non-specified components or elements. This rationale will also be used when the term ‘comprised’ or ‘comprising’ is used in relation to one or more steps in a method or process.
It is an object of the present invention to address the foregoing problems or at least to provide the public with a useful choice.
Further aspects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the ensuing description which is given by way of example only.